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Jersey's new States chief has used his first major public speech to focus on the real depth of poverty in the island, and its effect on local children.
Charlie Parker was speaking to a packed audience at the Chamber of Commerce, and set out his vision for reforming the public sector, describing some of the bureaucracy as "quite breath-taking."
In the question and answer session after his prepared speech Mr Parker talked about improving the teaching of useful skills to local people. He said that reform started with children, and revealed that there were around 300 children in the island's schools who came from families not able to give them breakfast in the morning or buy uniforms, and said that number was increasing. He said about half that number weren't even properly taught to use the toilet.
Mr Parker spoke of kids arriving at school with evidence of being bitten by rats at home:
"Skills are at the heart of a lot of what we've got to do, but skills start very early. Skills actually start with life chances, and if I'm being honest, we are not investing in the right levels if we are just concentrating straight away on the Further and Higher Education Sectors. Of course we need to do that, but we've also got to look at those life chances from very early on when you come into school.
"We've got to have more ambition, but it has to start at the beginning and unfortunately some of what's going on at the start of that food chain is really sub-optimal. We cannot have kids in that situation. At the end of the day when kids come to school covered in rat bites, we have a problem and we need to deal with that."
Regarding investment in Skills and HE 'We must start investing MUCH earlier than that. When children on the island are coming to school covered in rat bites, that is not acceptable and we must change that.' Charlie Parker #ChamberLunch
— Jersey Chamber (@jerseychamber) February 21, 2018
Earlier in his presentation, Mr Parker warned that his initial assessment showed while some bits of Jersey's public service worked well, other areas were in need of real improvement, and didn't compare well to the services provided in other places.
He also warned of the dangers of civil servants acting in their own self-interest, and not understanding the true impact of their actions on the economy.
"Firstly, I don’t think that staff fully understand the size of the impact of government on the island’s economy. I mean, by the term government, the public service machinery that supports the Council of Ministers and serves the public. Or how important we are to helping contribute to a strong economic agenda for Jersey.
"Equally, they don’t often realise how damaging the defence of vested interests, and/or self-interest by public servants, can be to our economy. This is in part because we don’t operate as a single public service.
"Secondly, our public services themselves are a curate’s egg. Some bits work well, but others – and a fair amount of services fall into this category – are quite frankly way below what you would expect, and lower than comparable services in other countries."
He said that he would shortly be releasing details of substantial reforms to the public sector, as part of a five-year plan, which would include a "streamlining" of senior and middle management - but he also signalled there would be more 'user pays' charges, and businesses would be likely to have to contribute more, to make sure that the island's finances didn't go into the red.
Pictured: Charlie Parker speaking to a packed Chamber lunch at the Royal Yacht Hotel. (Gary Grimshaw)
Mr Parker said improving productivity was essential to avoid creating a wider gap between the 'haves' and the 'have-nots':
"The real, long-term solution to this problem is to make it more attractive financially for Jersey residents to work in Jersey businesses; to make the investments in capital and process improvements that will drive the productivity gains needed to offset the additional costs; and to invest, as an island, in the high-value, high-skill sectors that will support the continued growth of our economy.
"Investing in education and skills, digital, and artificial intelligence – including in the financial and non-financial services – is critical. Otherwise, as the Fiscal Policy Panel and Standard and Poors have said, our economy will continue to flatline and our public finances will be stretched even more. That’s why we also need to look at the whole issue of income and taxation levels – especially in relation to businesses, not just households and individuals.
"Unless we face up to the difficult conversations and decisions now, when we look forward over the next Medium Term Financial Plan period, the position on public finances means that if we’re not careful, we’ll create an unsustainable deficit."
Great speech from Charlie Parker new CEO @StatesofJersey @jerseychamber lunch. He has gained good understanding of challenges facing public sector & Jersey very quickly. Also his focus on delivering class leading services to public is encouraging.
— Kevin Keen (@keenjersey) February 21, 2018
Mr Parker promised a cultural change in the way the States worked, and revealed that currently there was no way of measuring how well public services were being delivered in Jersey, compared to elsewhere. He said he had come across more forms in Jersey than anywhere else he had worked, describing the bureaucracy as "quite breath-taking:"
"First and foremost, (the new States) will be customer-focused. This means understanding our customers’ needs and behaviours and designing our services around them – not for our administrative convenience. It means not duplicating our activities – we do it once and get it right first time. And it means collecting and securely storing data about our customers, and capturing it only once, so they don’t have to keep telling us things we should already know.
"We’ll be one government service, with reduced management structures, working collaboratively to a common purpose – not a series of disconnected fiefdoms. We’ll have simple structures, that are easier to understand and to navigate, with clear accountability, responsibility and decision-making at the right level in the organisation.
"We’ll design a set of performance standards for all of our services – I’m calling this the Jersey Standard – and benchmark them against those provided by high-performing public sectors elsewhere in the world.
"At present, we have virtually no such standards. Yes, you heard me correctly – no real metrics."
Mr Parker set out five areas that he would focus on:
You can read the full text of Mr Parker's speech here.
Picture credits: Gary Grimshaw.
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